A Christian Glance At The Koran, or The Hidden Traps

I'VE WARNED OF THIS, but some things have to be done by yourself. So here's a quick look at what's in the first parts of the Koran, including the hook for Catholics to cross over, one presumably good for Protestants as well.

What's clear from the opening part of it, as Mohammed declares the people of the Jewish faith and those that are Christian to be flawed Muslims, is that the main "holy war" that the Koran teacheth is against hypocrisy covered by verbal fealty. The words "just chastisement" appear many times in the opening chapters, and the general sin which earns this chastisement is paying lip service to the decrees of Mohammed while either secretly disobeying them or else - this too is a serious one - thinking that mouthing the words given by Allah to Mohammed are enough to make you a good Muslim.

This, basically, is the crime attributed to "the Jews." It is hinted in several places that "the Jew" excels in surface conversions, and/or agreeableness while holding in their unconscious a secret heart that is quite different from what they verbally profess. Being jocular about Islam tends to be seen by its believers as "mocking" the faith - which doesn't exactly make them your friends.

As far as Christianity is concerned, we're the amateur league for Islam. Not only is it not required for the pious Muslim to convert us, but Mohammed even supplies a re-written Lord's Prayer for Christians to speak, one that will not offend the Muslims in the community. This, obviously, applies only to Christians living in Islamic States.

It is a common misconception that the Muslims think of Christian men as women. This is not quite true: in their eyes, we're feminized by our faith. A Christian man is "womanly" as long as he sticks close to the words of Christ.

This isn't just politeness. The caliph of Turkey kept a colony of Christians in his lands for the express purpose of breeding soldiers - Jannissaries. The eldest son was the one who was drafted and then converted to Islam. What the history of Turkey shows is that these Christians-turned-Muslims made excellent soldiers.

Here's why. The recommended mechanism for conversion to Islam from Christianity is: conceptually, to deny the divinity of Christ by agreeing with Mohammed and Islam that Christ was taken down from the cross before he was dead, and thus renouncing belief in the Resurrection; and spiritually, as the first good work, to tread the path of Judas - but honorably.

What this means, specifically, is to accept that Judas was right to betray - but for the wrong motives: he cheated his soul by accepting the thirty pieces of silver for it. (There might be an anti-Semitic undertone to this.) You have to renounce Jesus Christ in a similar way, but not for reason of financial gain, nor out of spite - if the latter, there will be lots of "just chastisements" waiting for you. If you live in an Islamic country, or else are asked to by the local cleric, this might be a "good work" literally. You might have to betray Christ in front of a priest or minister of your old faith. That's what they'd see.

Since you have to "become Judas" in order to cross over, you'll wear a real "heart of stone" for a time - a feeling which those that are Christian, and have read the Koran recently because of the U.S. response to the terrorist attack, might have felt. This is unavoidable, it seems.

There are also a few other things you experience. Now that you've been stripped of your faith, you tend to feel a bit "womanly," too.

You remember all those stories about the "Ay-Rabs" from decades ago? What "all of them" are reputed to be like? At least some of these prejudices seem to be based upon the experience of Christians that have converted to Islam. Thus, these stereotypes are pro-Christian "stay with the flock" propaganda.

But they also seem to be based on the experience of Christians like myself reading the Koran, taking it seriously, and then realizing what they would be in for.

So if you are not a Muslim, have recently read the Koran, and are left with the feeling that all "towel heads" are security risks, what you are really picking up is the "betrayal" that YOU YOURSELF would have to go through in order to convert to Islam. You have to remember that the Koran is not only a book of religious laws and rules, but also is an apologetic for the faith. That, in part, is what it was given to Mohammed for, so the apologia is completely inseparable from the rest of it.

This tends to make you see "pro-terrorism" among Muslims where there might not be any.

So if you've read the Qur'an, and are volunteering for the position of loyalty sidewalk superintendent, I'd really recuse yourself, and leave it up to the professionals in the field. Let the professional cops (broadly speaking) look after this, because your old bias has been replaced by a new one.

I should know: I've felt the same thing myself. Some thing you can't but learn except for the hard way - 'tis the sad truth.

One important thing to note is that any "excellence in soldiering" that resulted from Christians soaking up the Koran is well accounted for by the most famous Talibani tactic: "running for the gun," or false defeat in a battle.

This implies that the Afghanis have faced Muslims before and are worried about having their country taken over - perhaps by recently-converted Muslims.

As far as the United States being the "humiliator of Mecca," this is a pretext. The undercurrent of bin Laden's "Islam" might very well be a mutant of Communism.

If they've forged close connections with Marxist terrorists, it would back this hypothesis up.

Sorry. In my defense, I will say that I've posted quite a few times, and this is the first rebuke I've gotten for posting in an incorrect category.

I'll be more careful next time.

But as far as the followup comment is concerned: one fundamental attribute of Communism is that "interest" and "profit" are described as the same thing. If profit has been declared by Talibani clerics to be a form of usury, then there probably is a Communist undertone to what they call "Islam."

Rememebr Tito's Yugoslavia turning into Milosevich's?

So here's a quick look at what's in the first parts of the Koran

Will Durant's "The Age of Faith" notes that the chapters of the Koran are arranged by length. He suggests starting at the end, because Mohammed's early suras were generally shorter than the ones written later. The actual order in which the passages were written is unknown. Each was dictated separately, and transcribed on one of various media (parchment, leather, palm leaves or bones). After being read to an assembly, the passages were deposited in various receptacles, with no special care to keep them in any order. "No collection of these fragments was made in the Prophet's lifetime", reports Durant, "but several Moslems knew them all by heart, and served as living texts. In the year 633, when many of these qurra had died and were not being replaced, the Caliph Abu Bekr ordered Mohammed's chief amanuensis, Zaid ibn Thabit, to 'search out the Koran and bring it together.' He gathered the fragments, says tradition, 'from date leaves and tablets of white stone, and the breasts of men.'"

[Abu Bekr was Mohammed's successor. 633 A.D. was the year after Mohammed died.]

Thanks for the suggestion: I'm about a third of the way through it in English.

But before starting, I read the second half in French. (The notes were really copious, so they had to break it into two volumes.)

This wasn't out of any showboating; I tried the same trick with an early work of Rousseau and it paid off - I saw things in it that I wouldn't have seen in English.

Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.